The following images were taken with a final production Canon EOS 1000D / Rebel XS, running firmware 1.0.3 and equipped with the standard EF-S 18-55mm IS kit lens.

The EOS 1000D / XS was set to Large Fine JPEG quality, Auto White Balance, Evaluative metering and the Standard Picture Style; High ISO Noise Reduction and the Auto Lighting Optimiser were set to their default OFF and Enable settings respectively. Image Stabilisation was enabled for all these handheld shots.

The crops are taken from the original files, reproduced at 100% and saved in
Adobe Photoshop CS2 as JPEGs with the default Very High quality preset, while
the resized images were made in Photoshop CS2 and saved with the default High
quality preset. The three crops are typically taken from far left, central and
far right portions of each image.

For this macro shot we increased the sensitivity to 400 ISO and positioned the camera as close at it would focus with the kit lens fully zoomed-in.

The increase to 400 ISO hasn't had a detrimental effect on the image, with the crops still appearing smooth, detailed and free of noise.

In this respect the 1000D / XS is already doing better than some entry-level DSLRs which can exhibit evidence of noise at this point. But the real test of high sensitivities is indoors under dim light, so let's move onto the next sample.